defectors, people who snuck out of north korea, thinking they would have freedom from the north korean regime in south korea, but now we re learning their personal information, including where they live, where they work, it has all been stolen. hackers targeted a computer at a nonprofit in south korea. it is a place that helps defectors resettle in that of more prosperous capitalist country. centers operated by a foundation set up by the south korean reunification ministry in 2010, the big concern is that north korea, and i have been to the country many times and have been told by officials they consider defectors, people who escape from the country scum, they actually call them the scum of the earth. there are legitimate north korea, that this information could, one, be used to track them down somehow but perhaps also, more frightening for them, the information could be used by the north korean government to put their families under monitoring and
surveillance. we know that sometimes defectors in south korea send messages back to their families in the north but they re not supposed to do that. it is technically against the law, and there could be very serious repercussions from the fact these people are now identified. their homes, their businesses, perhaps their phone numbers, all sorts of information that could be used potentially by north korea. although we need to be clear, we don t know for sure that north korea was actually behind this, but, of course, that is the suspicion. one defector said that he thinks north korea might try to kill him. now, a ministry spokesperson in south korea from the reunification ministry is telling cnn so far at least no harm has been observed due to this leak. and, again, while we don t know that north korea is behind this, we know that north korea has a long history of hacking, and they ve gotten pretty good at it. i mean you remember back in october, you know, a report claimed that hackers t
alarm. and they say it will never happen again. sara sidner, cnn, honolulu. round 2. north and south korea meeting again after more than two years without direct discussions, pyongyang says it is trying to improve relations with its southern neighbor. the north has made very clear that it will not negotiate its nuclear weapons. north korea also says sanctions had nothing to do with why they agreed to talk. for now both sides are focusing on how the north will participate in the winter olympics next monday in south korea. for the very latest, we re joined by cnn senior international correspondent ivan watson who is monitoring things for us from seoul. anything more we re learning about these current meetings, ivan? yeah, we learned from the south korean reunification ministry that north korea has basically said it would be willing to have another round of discussions to take place on wednesday, january 17th at the